Conventional information sharing networks allow subscribers of the network to share learned information with other subscribers. For example, suppose that a bank that subscribes to an information sharing network experiences an attack on its servers (e.g., a DDoS attack). The bank may discover that malicious communications used in the attack originated from certain IP addresses. The bank may then choose to upload these IP addresses to a database server within the information sharing network. In this way, other subscribers of the network may learn about the danger posed by communications from these IP addresses without suffering an attack.
Subscribers of conventional information sharing network acquire information provided to the network by other subscribers by submitting queries to the database server within the network. For example, suppose that another bank that subscribes to the network receives a suspicious communication originating from an IP address. That bank may submit a query to see if that IP address is known to be involved in malicious activity.